User blog:Oshani/The truth about greatness
Do you understand what is it like to be a real great human being? To be a great artist, a ground breaking innovator, or a true leader? Can you see what is common between Lau Tzu, Thomas Edison, Albert Einstein, Winston Churchill, M.K. Gandhi and all the other people (not very many of them) who acted in various areas of arts, science and politics and seem to have redefine our understanding of the world? One thing that is quite easy to notice is the difference between the way these people are seen by others to the way they see themselves. People tend to idolize those who they consider as great, believing that what make them stand out is some super human quality that they have. In enchant times cultural heroes where described as the children of the gods, or at least as endured by divine charisma. In modern times, we are looking for the "Mozart effect", or the "Da Vinci gene"... not less in vain, if you ask me... On the other hand, if you'd ask all the great people mentioned above, or any other real great man or woman for this matter, they would all dismiss all these attempts to describe them as superhuman, insisting that they are just regular people, and that anyone could do what they did. Are they just being modest, or the reason they claim to be "just people" is part of a deeper truth that they know their so called, "greatness" really depends upon? Surely when these people say that anyone could do what they did, they do not mean that anyone could write music like Mozart or paint like Leonardo Da Vinci, or even have the spiritual strength of M.K. Gandhi. These are indeed expressions of unique talents that not just anyone have. But perhaps what they mean is that the extraordinary talent that they have, or other great people have is not the most important ingredient in greatness. Thomas Edison once said that being an inventor is "10% inspiration and 90% hard work". Many people think that Edison has modestly credited only 10% to his own ingenuity and 90% to plain hard work, but that is not exactly so. In fact (perhaps not too modestly) it is the other way around. Inspiration is something you get from other people. Hard work is what you do - and this is the plain truth that so many people fail to accept: industry, wisdom, generosity, courage, compassion and all these other qualities that everybody have, because they do not require any special talent, these are the things that really matter! We are all different by circumstances, but equal in potential. The differences between us are determined by our genes, the era in which we where born, our country of origin and other things which are beyond our control. On the other hand we are all free to choose how to live our life based on certain human qualities which do not depend on external factors. Most people only understand this principle in part. They may recognize that it is not fair to judge people by their skin color or gender or faith, but still not realize that appreciating people according to some extraordinary talent or other feature that they supposedly have is just the same. The reason people do not understand this simple truth is that they fail to recognize their own qualities and instead look up at those which they idolize, pretending that if only they could be like them, everything would be okay in their lives. But the same people that we look up at, if they really deserve to serve as role models, understand that what really make them stand out, is not the extraordinary talent that they may really have, but the ability to recognize their own value as human beings, and put that into practice. If they really do have some special talent, they understand that it only enables them to break new ways and give us some new understanding of the world - and that once they have done that, it is up to their ability to use their "normal" human qualities, weather and how others can benefit from their new insights. This is why, when M.K. Gandhi was asked how can he say that anyone could do what he did, he replied, "It is very simple, you must be the change you want to see in others". He meant that before we look outside ourselves and demand the change from some one else, we must first look into the human qualities that exist in each and every one of us and demand from ourselves to put them into practice as best as we can. If there is a hidden Mozart, or Edison or Gandhi in us, this is the only way to bring them out effectively, but even if we are "just ordinary people", by making the best of what is completely up to us, we may still "just" be better parents to our children, better husbands or wives, better friends to our friends and have a better life in general - For "just anyone" can have the curiosity of Da Vinci, the courage of Marie Curie, the sincerity of Winston Churchill and the compassion of Mother Theresa. It is as simple as that, but maybe too simple for a world that prefers exaggeration and flamboyance over plain truths to understand.